I first heard the term semiotics whilst studying media at A level. It was loosely used and described but I can still remember my tutor explaining to me how it was the study of signs.
Semiotics is the study of how these signs communicate with us and when this was first explained to me it was presented as a prop in a film scene. These signs all have a connotation, a meaning referring to something other than what is initially apparent; it may lead us to search deeper within an image to find what else is trying to be said. Signs may differ between cultures, they may have other words for objects represented or a sign from the image may mean something different to us, it is how we interpret these items. An example of this is Darmi Halake Gilo by Fazal Sheikh 1992-93. Some people may see her as a woman who is poor, made to pose in the baron lands in Africa but if you look closer you could begin to think well she is wearing jewellery, this doesn’t happen to be an everyday commodity and could symbolise wealth. As said in Camera Lucida by Roland Barthes, ‘With regard to the heterogeneity of good photographs, all we can say is that the object speaks; it induces us, vaguely, to think.”
Semiotics can be broken down into the signifier and the signified, the physical form and then what it is referencing to, for example a top hat is just a hat but it could mean wealth from a certain time in history. The Vanities of Human Life by Harmen Steenwyck is a good example, we see a skull, an oil lamp, a recorder, a book etc which actually symbolise death, wealth, love of music, knowledge etc. Semiotics has been used via a range of media and invites the viewer to think hard about what the artist is truely trying to say to us.
(Roland Barthes, Camera Lucida, 1980, page38)
good - also comment on the semiotics of the images you have used
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